NYERERE AGAINST ISLAM IN ZANZIBAR AND

TANGANYIKA

PREAMBLE

"Without any question, the manner and the implications of the union between
Tanganyika and Zanzibar is the most misunderstood aspect of Tanzania's political
development. It may not matter very much when foreigners get confused, but
unfortunately there are many times when Tanzanians themselves appear to
misunderstand it."

Former Tanzanian President Julius Nyerere.

Dar es Salaam Government Printer, July 1970. p. 3.

INTRODUCTION
When the former Tanzanian President Julius Kambarage Nyerere made the above address
to his National Assembly that "the union between Zanzibar and Tanganyika is the most
misunderstood aspects of Tanzanian's political development" proved that he is the only
Tanzanian who knows "the manner and the implications of the union" after British
colonialism in East Africa.

During the British colonialism, Zanzibar was the only intellectual center for Islamization
of East African countries under the Zanzibar Sultanate. The Gofu and the Barza Mosques
allowed students from the East African countries for the Islamic education. The Zanzibar
Muslim Academy also offered the greatest hope for the vibrancy of Islam in East Africa.
Nyerere, a devout Catholic saw that the Islamic Zanzibar state, a threat to Christianity.
He masterminded a clandestine movement for the so called Zanzibar Revolution under
the leadership of John Okello, a radical Christian from Uganda. It was not only a prelude
to the creation of Tanzania, but a continuation of crusade against Islam and extension of
Christian colonialism.

THE INFLUENCE OF ZANZIBAR EMPIRE

The Zanzibar Empire under the Sultanate stretched from Cape (Rãs) Asir in the Banadir
coast of Somalia to the Ruvuma river at the Cape Delgado, and inland beyond the great
lakes. In addition, its ruler held sway over all the south-eastern corner of Arabia. His
influence stretched beyond even these extensive borders. At the time of the heyday of the
Empire, Zanzibar became celebrated in the well-known saying that: "When you play flute
at Zanzibar, all Africans as far as the Lakes (Tanganyika, Malawi and Victoria) dance."
This Zanj Empire has passed, but much of its influence remains. Swahili, identified as an
Afro-Islamic language is one of the first seven most principal languages of the world. It
has spread far and wide from Zanzibar to Congo, the fomer Zaire. In Southern Arabia,
Western India and Madagascar, there are people who speak Swahili. Many of the Creoles
in Mauritius and Rêunion are of Zanzibar origin. Their language, though French in its
vocabulary, is Swahili in its grammar. One may even hear in the Creole of Mauritius
folk-lore similar to the Swahili of Zanzibar. It was recently in 1960's that Tanganyika,
Kenya and Uganda adopted Swahili as their national and political, but not the official
language unlike Zanzibar. Its nationality was possible due to the non-ethnic identity of
Swahili, according to some allegation. Therefore, Swahili is the language of Muslims in
East Africa, similar to Arabic in the Muslim world. The Zanzibar Swahili, derived from
the Sumarian dialect is the only language which has borrowed a higher proportions of its
vocabulary from Arabic than English has from Latin.

But soon after the demise of the Anglo-Dutch Colonialism in East Africa, Zanzibar was
kept in isolation from the Muslim world since 1964 due to the fact that it was the only
country in East Africa where the Islamic Law was the fundamental law of the country.
Zanzibar was not only the most active opposition to aggressive encroachment of the
Christian powers from Kenya to Tanganyika, but the intellectual center of Swahili culture
and Islamic education in this African region. Former Principal of the Zanzibar Muslim
Academy, Sheikh Sayyid bin Omar bin Abdullah bin Abu Bakr bin Salim (1917-1988),
graduated from the Oxford University of London stated that the Zanzibar islands were
instrumental in the penetration of the Shafi'i school to Tanganyika (Tanzania), Kenya and
Uganda around the period of Abu Hamid Muhammad al-Ghazzali (1058-1111), a
Professor of Nidhamiyãh Shafi'i Muslim Academy in Baghdad and disciple of Abdullah
Muhammad Idriss al-Shafi'i (767-820), founder of Shafi'i School of Jurisprudence.

This can be substantiated by the globetrotter from Morocco Abu Abdullah ibn
Muhammad ibn Abdullah ibn Muhammad ibn Ibrahim al-Zawati al-Tunzi (1304-1378),
famous as Ibn Batuta who visited the East African Muslim islands, including Mombasa
and Pemba, the two sister islands of Zanzibar. He explained the presence of Muslim
community with Islamic Schools, scholars of Shafi'i Fiqh (Jurisprudence) and
descendants of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) in the East African islands. Sheikh
Abdullah Saleh al-Farsy (1912-1982), an international historian and great ulama of
Zanzibar has described some intellectual Shafi'i ulama of Zanzibar during the Sultanate,
though it was under the British Colonialism. The Sultans used to send Shafi'i scholars to
Tanganyika for its Islamization.

ISLAMIZATION OF TANGANYIKA

During colonialism, Islamization of Tanganyika started from Zanzibar where Sheikh

Muhyddin bin Sheikh bin Abdullah al-Qahtany (1789-1869), the Chief Qadhi and Prime
Minister of Zanzibar under Sultan Said bin Sultan (1806-1856) had numerous local
students. Sheikh Muhyddin bin Sheikh Abdullah al-Qahtany authored many Arabic
books, including Takãlibun al-Haruf, his famous one on nahw (grammar) which he taught
this text at the Masjid al-Haramyn in Mecca, but his most popular book in the West is the
redaction of the well known Kitãb as Sulwa fi Akhbar Kilwa (The History Book
Concerning the Pleasure of Kilwa), first translated into English by S. Arthur Strong in
1875 under the title Arabic Kilwa Chronicle. But its Arabic version of Sheikh Muhyddin
al-Qahtany was donated to the British Museum (Or. 2666) by John Kirk, a British
colonialist in Zanzibar (1873-1887) during the reign of Barghash bin Said bin Sultan
(1870-1888), whose first printing press in East Africa under the directorship of Sheikh
Ali bin Khamis bin Salim bin Barwan (1852-1885) was used for the publication of al-
Najah (The Success), Pan-Islamic newspaper which had a wide subscription outside
Zanzibar to Algeria, Egypt, Oman and Libya.

Sheikh Muhyddin bin Sheikh bin Abdullah al-Qahtany had numerous students in
Zanzibar similar to Sayyid Ahmad Abu Bakr al-Sumait (1861-11925) and Sheikh
Abdullah Abu Bakr Bakathir (1860-1925), the two intellectual Shafi'i scholars in East
Africa. One of their famous itinerant students was Sheikh Hassan bin Ameir bin Hassan
al-Shirazy (1887-1986), a graduate of al-Azhar University. In Zanzibar, he studied under
Sheikh Abdullah Amour al-Azry and Sheikh Abdul Rahman bin Mahmoud al-Washil
Mngazija (1872-1936) as well as Sheikh Muhammad bin Ali Muhammaad al-Mandhri
(1825-1895) and Sheikh Muhammad bin Abdulla bin Wazir, the first person who
translated the Qur'an into Swahili language.

Sheikh Hassan bin Ameir bin Hassan al-Shirazy taught at Makunduchi, his birth place
before Muyuni and Kiembe Samaki Primary Schools. He became a town clerk and later
resigned for accepting a post of a Qadhi at Chake Chake in Pemba where he taught many
students. Of his famous student was Sheikh Said bin Omar bin Abdullah bin Abu Bakr
bin Salim (1917-1988), known as Sheikh Msaada. He graduated from the Oxford
University and was the last Principal of the Zanzibar Muslim Acedemy. His other student
was Sheikh Fattawi bin Issa bin Hassan bin Musa al-Shirazy (1900-1987), born at
Makunduchi (South of Zanzibar) and was appointed the Qadhi at Mkokotoni (North of
Zanzibar) at the age of sixteen under Sultan Khalifa bin Haroub bin Thuwein (1911-
1960), and taught at Makunduchi for many years until he was appointed the Chief Qadhi.
Sheikh Ameir bin Tajo bin Ameir al-Shirazy, also born at Makunduchi was one of the
most political activist students of Sheikh Hassan bin Ameir and Sheikh Fattawi bin Issa.
He was one of the founders of the Shirazi Association and the Zanzibar and Pemba
People's Party (ZPPP) and became the Chief Qadhi of Zanziabr after Sheikh Fattawi bin
Issa.

Sheih Hassan Ameir Hassan authored many books in both Swahili and Arabic, including
Al-Iqd al-Iqyãn alã-Mawlid al-Jailãni which is used by the Qadriyyah Muslim
Brotherhood throughout East Africa. He also taught and wrote several Islamic books at
Zaire and Malawi as his teacher, Sheikh Abdullah bin Mjana bin Kheir, born at
Mkokotoni in Zanzibar who also taught Zaire and Malawi. The first Muslim from
Zanzibar to Malawi was Salim bin Abdullah, who lived at Nkotakota from 1840. He was
given a title of Jumbe (chief) and encouraged the Yao and Chewa chiefs to send their
sons and nephews to Zanzibar to study Islam. Although the Jumbeship was abolished by
the British colonialists in 1895, Nkotakota is the most strong hold of Islam in Malawi
until today, predominantly by Yao and Chewa.

Sheikh Hassan bin Ameir bin Hassan al-Shirazy was the instrumental figure for
Islamization and political movement in Tanganyika under the auspices of the Zanzibar-
based Qadriyyah Muslim Brotherhood. According to Professor August H. Nimtz, he was
"the most popular teacher in terms of students in Tanzania." He left Zanzibar in 1940 for
Dar es Salaam, where he built his patronized Islamic School, Madrãsatul al-Shiraziyyah
(The Shirazy School) at the Comorian Mosque. He founded the Daw'at al-Islamiyyãh
(Invitation to Islam) and a member of the Jamiyyãt al-Islamiyyãh fi Tanganyika
(Tanganyika Muslims Association) founded in 1934 by Kleist Sykes and advisor of the
East African Muslim Welfare Society (EAMWS), founded in 1945.

CRUSADE AFTER INDEPENDENCE

It was not until recently when the study of Islam in East Africa has attracted much
attention of contemporary scholars. But most of them neglect the Crusades against Islam
in East Africa, and Zanzibar in particular. It is neglected because such a religious conflict
seems to belong to the Middle East, despite the Crusade against Islam is ecumenical
imperative in any Muslim country, including Zanzibar. In case of the Catholic Crusade in
Zanzibar, Nyerere worked hand in glove with Oscar Kambona, his close confidante and
schoolmate at the Edinburgh University, where in 1910, the Second World Conference of
Churches (WCC) discussed the threat to Islam in East Africa. It was unanimously agreed
that an African Christian is better (for leadership) than an African Muslim. Every sort of
assistance was therefore given to Nyerere in order to combat Islam in East Africa after
the demise of the British Colonialism.

When Tanganyika gained its independence in 1961, Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya, Milton
Obote of Uganda and Julius Nyerere of Tanganyika had a Summit Meeting at Nairobi on
June 5, 1963. In this conspiracy of the Christian leaders, Zanzibar was neither represented
nor mentioned in this Summit. These leaders unanimously pledged their selfish regional
Declaration under the spirit of Pan-Africanism:

We (Nyerere, Obote and Kenyatta), the leaders of the people and Governments of
East Africa (i.e. Tanganyika, Uganda and Kenya)...pledge ourselves to the
political federation of East Africa and we are prompted by the spirit of Pan-
Africanism, and not by mere selfish regional interests. (p. 1).

When Zanzibar gained independence on December 10, 1963 from the British
government, it became a member of the Commonwealth nations. It joined the United
Nations on December 16, 1963 and was represented by Hilal bin Muhammed bin Hilal.
But when the new Zanzibar Government declared to form the model of the Islamic State,
it was orchestrated by Afro-Christian Crusaders as reincarnation of Arabisation and
revivalism of Islamization. They invaded Zanzibar in the midnight of January 11, 1964
under the self-appointed "Field Mashal" John Okello, a militant Christian from Uganda.
The objective of the Zanzibar revolution was a Crusade against Islam as Okello stated in
his book entitled Revolution in Zanzibar that God appointed him to make revolution for
the sake of Christianity. He then quoted the following Biblical passage for his
justifications:

Go now, you rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon
you! Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and
silver is cankered, and rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat
your flesh as if were fire. You have reaped down your fields in cries of them
which have reaped are entered into ears of the Lord of Sabbath. You have lived in
pleasure on the earth and been wanton. You have nourished your hearts as in a
day of slaughter. You have not, you kill and desire to have and cant obtain fight
and war, yet you have not asked, and receive not, because you ask amiss, that you
consume it upon your lusts (James 5:1-6).

Okello also said that his "Freedom Fighters" came from Tanganyika, Kenya, Uganda,
Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), Nyasaland (Malawi) and Mozambique. They killed 13,635
Muslims and 21,462 were detained. He failed to tell us that his Zaznibar Revolution
under the auspices of Nyerere, reminiscent of the Spanish Inquisition which led to the last
stronghold of the Muslim State in Spain. On January 11, 1964 Okello commanded the
Crusaders that all Arabs (Muslims) between the age of 18 and 55 must be killed. In the
next day, the Muslim holocaust began when Okello said in the Radio Zanzibar the
following:

I am Fidel Marshal! Okello! You imperialists, there is no longer an imperialist

government on this Island. This is now the government of the Freedom Fighters.
Wake up you black men. Let everyone of you take a gun and ammunition and
start to fight against any remnants of imperialism in this islands. (p. 143).

In the same morning, Okello issued an ultimatum to Jamshid bin Abdullah bin Khalifah
bin Haroub (1963-1964), the Zanzibar Sultan: "You are allowed twenty minutes to kill
your children and wives and then kill yourself." (p. 145) but he escaped through
Mombasa, Kenya. The mainland Africans' support to overthrow the Zanzibar
Government was due to the fact that the Crusaders had a large number of modern arms
from Kenya and or Tanganyika from where 600 Crusaders invaded Zanzibar Keith Kyle,
a British correspondent for East Africa in his articles in the Spectator of entitled
"Gideon's (Okello) Voices" (February 7, 1964) and "How it Happened" (February 14,
1964) said that "certain (Christian) members of the Tanganyika Government were
involved in Revolution" (Crusade) of Zanzibar.

It is known that the holocaust was so horrendous that 100 Muslims were baked to death
in tanuri (the copra-kiln) at Bambi. Following the Muslims holocaust, Abeid Karume
(1905-1972), born in Nyasaland (now Malawi) became the President of the People's
Republic of Zanzibar. Karume secretly collaborated with the former Tanganyikan
President Nyerere, an Islamophobic for the merger of Zanzibar and Tanganyika. Similar
situation took place in Mindanao, an Islamic State founded by Sultan Sayyid bin Abu
Bakr al-Hadhramy over 400 years before the ascendancy of the Roman Catholic Church
in the Philippines and Tanganyika.

FROM MINDANAO TO ZANZIBAR

One day after the Crusade in Zanzibar, the Kenyan African National Union (KANU)
Youth Wingers held an emergency meeting in Nairobi. In this meeting, "a unanimous
resolution was passed hailing the overthrew of the Zanzibar regime." This was followed
by the two-days Kenyan Cabinet Ministers, summoned to the Prime Minister's Office. It
was attended by the Tanganyikan Minister for External Affairs, Oscar Kambona, a
member of the World Council of Churches, and the Ugandan Minister of State, Magezi,
while the Kenyan Minister of State and Foreign Affairs, Joseph Marumbi was in touch
with Zanzibar by telephone. He collaborated with Edington Kisasi, a Catholic from
Moshi in Tanganyika who was the Zanzibar Superintendent of Police installed by the
British and he became the first Police Commissioner after the Crusade in Zanzibar. Also
attended the Cabinet meeting to discuss the aftermath of Crusade were the British High
Commission in Kenya, the British Forces in Kenya, and the Inspector-General of Police,
R.C. Cating.

Within the first hundred days after the Catholic Crusade in Zanzibar, Nyerere
collaborated with eminent Christian leaders in East Africa and imperialistic powers for
the union between Tanganyika and Zanzibar. This Christian conspiracy was so important
that the US government under President Lyndon B. Johnson (1963-1969) accorded
Zanzibar a top priority in the US foreign policy, next to Vietnam and Cuba. William
Attwood, the then US ambassador in Kenya said that "the Western powers prepared a
contingency plan in case the Union would fail...and (after the union), the laws of
Tanganyika would become supreme to round up (Muslim) radicals in Zanzibar." Also the
US Secretary of State, Dean Rusk appealed that "it is essential for Nyerere to be given the
maximum support from the West." Therefore, when Nyerere went to Zanzibar on April
22, 1964 to pressure Karume for the union with Tanganyika, he had already dispatched
his soldiers to Zanzibar on January 13, 1964 with ammunition allegedly for security
reasons, after consultation with Okello. Martin Bailey quoted Nyerere when he addressed
the mass rally at Dar es Salaam on November 15, 1964:

We sent our police to Zanzibar. After overcoming various problems we united.

We ourselves voluntarily agreed on union. Karume and I met. Only the two of us
met. When I mentioned the question of the union Karume did not even give it a
second thought. He instantly asked me to call a meeting of the press to announce
our intention. I advised him to wait a bit as it was too early for the press to be
informed. (p. 31).
This is a clear testimony that the union of Zanzibar and Tanganyika was the creation of
Karume, a racist dictator nominal Muslim from Nyasaland (Malawi) and Nyerere, an
autocratic devout Christian from Tanganyika. And consequently, Zanzibar has lost her
strong Islamicity and sovereignty to Tanganyika since April 26, 1964 when the dictator
Karume, signed the Articles of the Union, drafted by British expatriates, Attorney
General Roland Brown and Chief Parliamentary Draftsman, P.R.N. Fifoot, to form
Tanzania under the clique of the Christian Church Movement (CCM) of Tanganyika. The
Constitution drafted by the British colonialists was unilaterally used by the Tanganyikan
Government as the Interim Constitution of Tanzania, did not contain freedom of religion
as independent clause to the detriment of the Islamic State of Zanzibar. Professor David
Westerlund has pointed out that:

In such a religiously divided country, the issue of religion was a sensitive one, and
in 1965 the situation was no different from 1961 in this respect. In fact, it could be
argued further that it was even more sensitive after the revolution in Zanzibar in
1964, when the Arab sultan was overthrown and the Islamic State of Zanzibar
ceased to exist. This change constituted a serious blow to those Muslims....(p. 90).

A similar situation of ethnic cleansing and the holocaust that went with it, was attempted
to turn Bosnian Muslims into the Christians, and bring Bosnia-Herzegovina into the
"Greater Serbia" under the Greek Orthodox Serbs or "Greater Croatia" under the Roman
Catholic Croats since 1941. The same experiment was successfully conducted by the
Catholics to the Mindanao Muslims. They were forcibly merged with the Philippines in
1946 by the American government "to civilize and Christianize the Muslims" as said by
William McKinley, the assassinated US President (1891-1901) who had invaded the
Philippines and the Mindanao islands. After the merger, the Muslims were considered
outcasts in their own land and establishment of the Catholic Churches was encouraged
but the Muslim world seemed to have lost its sense of history and treat the problems of
Mindanao as if it were purely internal affairs of the Philippines and as if the Muslims
were always ruled by a Catholic establishment.

The geopolitical limbo between Zanzibar and Tanganyika is a continuation of Christian

colonialism under the clique of Catholic leadership. As in the Philippines, where
thousand of Catholics were sent in exodus to overpopulate the Muslims in Mindanao, the
Catholics in Tanganyika are sent to overpower the Muslims in Zanzibar. They worked to
remove any immigration restrictions from Tanganyika to Zanzibar as done by Catholics
from the Philippines to Mindanao islands. Similar to the Muslim legacy in the Mindanao,
Christianization of Zanzibar islands in the next millennium, will be the greatest
achievement of Nyerere and the history of the Catholic Church Movement (CCM) in
Tanzania at large, and Africa in general.

NYERERE ON ISLAM IN ZANZIBAR

It appears that Nyerere is one of the best known political figure, but the least understood
of African leaders. Millions of Africans who struggled for liberation from the Western
imperialism, believed that Nyerere is the supreme theoretician and practitioner of the
African Liberation. Others concidered him as the man who committed himself and the
resources of his country to rid the African continent from the hegemony of European
colonialism and apartheid, sponsored by the Ducth Reformed Church, the major evils of
Western imperialism in the African history. According to some political philosophers,
Nyerere is the most outstanding political guru, thinker, writer and spokesmen in Africa
and the chief architect of socialism in Tanzania, branded as "Romantic Tanzaphilia" by
Professor Ali A. Mazrui.

In the Euro-Christian parlance, Nyerere was a serious bulwark against what was believed
as Communism in Zanzibar. This was concorted and by the American Government.
because the book, US Foreign Policy and Revolution: the Creation of Tanzania by Amrit
Wilson revealed some official US documents, including from the CIA that regarded
Nyerere as the only "responsible" African leader to suppress (Islam in) Zanzibar which
was erroneously equated with communism during the Cold war. Before the creation of
Tanzania in 1964, Nyerere was frequently heard and so quoted that he wished he could
tow out Zanzibar into the Indian Ocean, if he can. Tanzania received more Western aid
per capita than any other African country. But to many Islamists in Zanzibar, Nyerere is a
devout Catholic and Crusader against Islam in Zanzibar though it was only recently that
the book "The Course of Islam in Africa" by Mervyln Hiskett indicated that the Union
was imposed by Nyerere for Crusade against Islam in Zanzibar:

Union was imposed on the Muslims of Zanzibar by Nyerere, a militant Christian

and his henchmen Okello against the will of the Zanzibari people, and that has
been followed by a deliberate campaign to extinguish the Islamic character of
Zanzibar under a secular constitution." (p. 170).

This started after Nyerere had expelled the active Tanganyikan Muslims from their
executive leadership of TANU, he exerted his efforts for intervention of the Muslims in
Zanzibar. He first manipulated Abeid Amani Karume (1905-1972), born in Nyasaland
(Malawi) who was the President of the African Association (AS) but his party was not
formed for the independance of Zanzibar. Because they stated in their AFRIKA
KWAETU (Afrika is Our Home), the official mouthpiece of the African Assocaition:

We wish to assure all the so called Zanzibaris that anything short of an African
state will never be accepted when self-government is achieved in this
Protectorate. We are also opposed to multi-racial government in these islands. It is
against all this Association stands for. We want Zanzibar to become an African
state like the Gold Coast. (Afrika Kwetu, May 5, 1955).

Nyerere manipulated Abeid Karume to merge the African Association (AA), a surrogate
of Tanganyikan Association (TAA) under Nyerere, with the Shirazi Association (SA),
whose President was Thabit bin Kombo bin Jecha al-Shirazy (1904-1988), a Muslim born
at Kizimkazi in Zanzibar. Nyerere formed Afro-Shirazi Party (ASP) on February 5, 1957
but under Karume. Consequently in 1960, Sheikh Muhammad bin Shamte bin Hamad al-
Shirazy, a school Principal born at Chambani, Pemba and Sheikh Ameir Tajo Ameir al-
Shirazy, formed the Zanzibar and Pemba Peoples' Party (ZPPP) whose Secretary General
was Abdullah Amour Suleiman al-Shirazy, born at Pemba. He was the editor of
Mwangaza (The Light), the mouthpiece of the ZPPP, believed as the sole party for the
indigenous Muslims in the Zanzibar and Pemba.

Orientalists emphasize the differences between the Africans and Arabs but ignore the
impact of Islam, which is so strong in Zanzibar politics that led the coalition of the ZPPP
and Zanzibar Nationalist Party (ZNP) in 1961, after the ASP had failed to win the support
of the ZPPP to form a coalition force for the so called African independence. Following
their discussion with Sheikh Ameir Tajo Ameir and the ZNP delegates flew to Pemba for
discussion with Sheikh Muhammad Shamte Hamadi. Other delegates were Sheikh Miraji
Shaalab, Abdul Rahman Muhammad Babu, Sheikh Maalim Hilal and Sheikh Ali Muhsin.

Nyerere ruled for twenty eight years (1961-1989) as the President and the Chairman of
the ruling party in Tanzania. During his chauvinistic and autocratic leadership, the Rev.
Frank Schildknecht, a White Father who monitored all the Muslim activities throughout
the African continent for the Roman Catholic Church sent a report in July 1963 to the
Pope at the Vatican City that the East African Muslim Welfare Society (EAMWS) is
becoming stronger and constitute a threat to the future of Christianity for spreading Islam.
The EAMWS built several mosques, dispensaries and twenty three schools throughout
the East African countries. It also The proposed to build the first Muslim University in
Zanzibar, similar to the Beirut University to produce local Muslim professionals. On
February 25, 1965, Nyerere banned the Muslim Education Union which was founded to
train Muslims who were not allowed into the government primary schools. He also
banned the EAMWS in 1968 with following short statement:

The Minister of Home Affair has by command of the President (Julius Nyerere)
declared the Tanzania Branch of the East African Muslims Welfare Society
(EAMWS) and Tanzania Council of the East African Muslim Welfare Society to
be unlawful societies under the provisions of section 6(1) of the Societies
Ordinance. (The Standard, December 20, 1968).

The advisor of the EAMWS Sheikh Hassan bin Ameir al-Shirazy was arrested and
deported to Zanzibar. The Jamiyãt al-Islãmiyyah fi Tanganyika, which focused on the
pressing educational needs of Muslims in Tanganyika was also banned in 1970 in the gist
of secularism of education, before the government expressed its hostility in 1973 that
only adults could perform Hajj (pilgrimage) to Saudi Arabia and only once in their life
time. Some Christians are hostile to Hajj because it is used for the enhancement of the
global Muslim Brotherhood and enrichment of the Islamic education among the pilgrims.

Nyerere's vicious Crusade against Zanzibar to join the Organization of Islamic

Conference (OIC), was unprecedented. His government suggested in 1988 to change the
name of Dar es Salaam (The House of Islam), the capital of Tanzania where the Popal
Office is represented for the African continent. But hostility to Islam was manifested on
May 7, 1988 during the Conference of the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi (The Party of
Revolution) at Dodoma. Under his Chairmanship in the Conference, the Chama Cha
Mapinduzi suggested the abrogation of Islamic Law in Tanzania, though 65% of its
population is Muslim. This political crusade under the auspices of the rulimg party,
triggered a mammoth demonstration in Zanzibar on May 9, 1988 by Muslim youth after
the Juma’a (Friday) prayers during the month of Ramadhãn.

While the Muslims protested and demanded restoration of the Islamic State in Zanzibar, a
massive police contingent, armed with clubs, tear gas and guns attacked the protesters. In
the shooting, Ali Mansour Ali, active member of the Dãwat al-Islamiyyãh, was martyred.
One of the protesters died the following day in the General Hospital among other hundred
who were hospitalized but scores, including female Islamists were accused of "inciting"
instability against secularism. It was imposed by Nyerere in 1979 when he addressed
some Muslims at the Beit al-Ajaib (The House of Wonders) in Zanzibar.

Adding the fuel to the fire, the police arrested four ulama, including Sheikh Nassor bin
Ali, imam of the Kikwajuni Mosque. They were accused of being the instigators of the
demonstration because shortly after of theirKhutba (sermon) in the Muslim youths mass
demonstration protesting the blantant suggestion for the abbrogation of Islamic Law in
Tanzania. After the mass demonstration, Seif Shariff Hamad, the then charismatic Chief
Minister of Zanzibar (1984-1988), famous for being outspoken and his sentiments were
linked with Islam, was sacked with his six colleagues; namely Soud Yusuf Mgeni,
Minister for Agriculture and Livestock Development as well as member of the National
Executive Committee (NEC) of the ruling party of CCM. Others were Hamad Rashid
Muhammad, union Deputy Minister of Finance, Planning and Economic Affairs,
Suleiman Seif Hamad, Deputy Speaker of Zanzibar House of Representative, Khatib
Hassan Khatib, Member of Parliament, Shaaban Khamis Mloo, Member of House of
Representative, Ali Haji Pandu, Member of House of Representative and Minister of
Natural Resources and Tourism also former Chief Justice and Masoud Omar Said,
Minister of Education. Ali Saleh, a freelance journalist who informed the BBC about the
Muslim protest in Zanzibar against abrogation of Islamic Law in Tanzania, was thrown
into jail and more Christian soldiers were sent to contain the Muslim "fundamentalists" in
Zanzibar. This was accordance with recommendation of the American CIA for the
creation of Tanzania. It was recommended by William Attwood, the then US ambassador
in Kenya that "the Western powers prepared a contingency plan in case the Union would
fail...and (after the union), the laws of Tanganyika would become supreme to round up
(Muslim) radicals in Zanzibar."

The situation was aggravated by the Crusadic visit to Zanzibar in March 1989 of Nyerere,
whose well publicized speeches called for tougher repressive measures against what he
described as "dissidents" in Zanzibar, where Islamists interpreted his visit and speeches
as a CCM conspiracy against Islam. As interpreted, his visit led to massive arrests of
leading public figures, including Seif Shariff Hamad, who was jailed for allegedly being
in possession of secret government documents. He was then purportedly rumored by the
CCM on charge of being foreign agent and adui (enemy) of the Union though many
young Islamists in Zanzibar extolled him as shujaa (hero) and charismatic leader. He was
released in 1991 due to pressure from the Amnesty International.

Prior to his prominence in Zanzibar, Seif Shariff was so active in Islamic movement that
he had served as the president of Muslim Students Association of the University of Dar
es Salaam (MSAUD), and he worked with Professor Muhammad Hussein Malik, an
Islamist from Pakistan who came to Dar es Salaam in 1964. Both Islamists had played a
formative role in the ideological development of Muslim Youths in Tanganyika and
formed Workshop ya Waandishi wa Kiislamu (Muslim Writers Workshop) in 1975. It
was unprecedented that Professor Muhammad was forced to leave Tanzania.

When Seif Shariff returned to Zanzibar, he challenged the status quo and became the
most favored leader of the opposition party, the Civic Union Front (CUF) in Zanzibar for
the 1995 general election in Tanzania, the last East African country to reluctantly accept
the inevitable of multi-partism for power sharing. The state control media favors the
CCM which received TShs. 250m (£330,000.00) for her campaign, while the CUF was
given only TShs. 1.5m (£1,562.00). Members of the electoral commission are
predominantly Christians and some are apologetic to Christianity or puppets of Nyerere
who is pathologically opposed to any Islamic leadership for the betterment of the
Christian Church Movement in Tanzania.

THE CATHOLIC CHURCH MOVEMENT

Jan P. van Bergen's book quoted Nyerere by saying that the interest of his (Roman)
Church came first, and would never go against his Church so as to liberate it from the
matope (mud), which it has accumulated by being identified with world situation in
Europe. This is clear testimony indicated that Nyerere ruled his country for the
betterment of clandestine Catholic Church Movement (CCM), in Tanzania and Muslims
in this country were the first in the world who contributed money to the Catholic
secessionist state of Biafra in Nigeria to fight against their fellow Muslims in Nigeria, the
most populous Muslim nation in Africa. The Catholic Church Movement in Biafra
demanded to secede to rid themselves in what they called "a calamitous slavery in an
ocean of Muslims." In contrary, a number of Muslim troops from Zanzibar were
disproportionately killed during the Nyerere's invasion of Uganda in 1979 which toppled
a Muslim ruler, Iddi Amin and re-installed Nyerere's old friend, Milton Obote, a
Christian who supported Nyerere for the creation of Tanzania in collaboration with the
Central Inteligence Agency (CIA) whose director was George Bush, later the former US
President.

Their huge Christian Churches as well as many seminaries and proliferation of foreign
priests and sisters in Tanzanian Churches, is a firm evidence that Christian organizations
in Tanzania are affiliated with and used by foreign countries, because they can not
through their local donation alone to carry out such activities and finance the lavish-style
of their Church leaders. All the Churches and monasteries in Tanzania are the property of
the Western nations, from where they recieve their orders and budgets for evangelism.
For instance, the Tanzanian Catholic Church is the property of Italians, Portuguese,
Spaniards, Belgians and French, the Lutheran Church is the property of Germans and
Dutch, the architect of the apartheid in South Africa. The Anglican Church is the property
of the British, the Moravian Church is the property of the Nordic countries, the Church of
Pentecostal Assemblies of God, Seventh Day Adventists and African Inland Mission,
among others are the properties of the United States. Further evidence of their affiliation
is that all the Churches in developing countries, including Tanzania are referred to as
"provinces" meaning that they are a sort of institutional chapters, and that their highest
leadership is from the Western countries instead of host countries.

The proliferation of Western Churches in Tanzania, led to the formation of many

organizations such as the Tanzania Episcopal Conference (TEC), the Catholic Secretariat
representing the largest Christian denomination; the Evangelical Lutheran Church in
Tanzania (ELCT), representing the non-Catholic denomination; the Christian Council of
Tanzania (CCT), comprising of Protestant Missionary Societies, the Office of the
Anglican Archbishops, the Office of the Archbishop of the Greek Orthodox Church and
the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahais, among others. The Tanzanian Churches
are affiliated either with World Council of Churches or Lutheran World Federation. In
contrast, the Muslims in Tanzania are marginalized and they are not allowed to be
affiliated with any global Muslim organization, whether the Organization of Islamic
Conference (OIC) or the Islamic Organization of Africa (IOA), in the gist that Tanzania
is a secular state, despite the fact that secularism is a Christian ethos of governance
(Matthew 22:21) and mimicked from the Western nations like the Unites States.
Ironically, that Tanzania is a member of the Commonwealth, whose chief should always
be the head of the Anglican Church of England, the former colonial ruler before the
ascendancy of Nyerere in Zanzibar and Tanganyika.

Education Under Christian Leadership

To many uninformed people, Nyerere is a public defender of secularism in the ruling

Party and the government. But his secret meetings with Church leadership is quite the
opposite. In his confidential conversation on August 2, 1970, with Rev. Robert
Rweyemaum, the then Secretary General of Tanzania Episcopal Conference (TEC), the
largest Christian denomination of Catholic Church, Nyerere is quoted in a book
Development and Religion in Tanzania by J. P. van Bergen as saying that he has
established in TANU a department of political education and that he deliberately
appointed a Christian minister to head it not because he was a strong politician but
because of his Catholic Faith. This book published by the Catholic Church stated that this
reason the Rev. Mushendwa with his strong solid Christian faith, was put in charge of
TANU's Development of Political Education. Nyerere continued what was left by the
British educational discparity against the Muslims. He was aware of Muslim's grievance
in the area of education. He wrote in his book Freedom and Unity that the disparity of
educational levels could be used as a political issue:

The enmity which could be stirred by the evil minded between Muslims and
Christians as we all know, the colonial government did not concern itself very
much with education and therefore the majority of those who managed to acquire
did so in the mission schools, and are therefore mostly Christians. Here again,
then we have a division by its very existence constitutes a political threat to unity.
(p. 179).

The Muslims in Tanganyika who pioneered and led the grassroot struggle against the
Anglo-Ducth colonial rule to end oppression have not reaped the fruits of their labor
since the 1961 independence. Many questions are now being asked by the contemporary
Muslims about this bag puzzle. Educational disparity between Muslims and Christians
goes on abated. In Tanganyika, Muslims claimed that they have been marginalised in
their own country before and after independence. Their past experience with Nyerere
convinced them that it is unfair to expect Christian, however sincere or honest he might
appear to the public, to safeguard the interest of Muslims. He vowed not to improve the
level of Muslim education in Tanganyika and Zanzibar.

Recent study conducted by G.A. Malekela, a Christian Professor in the Faculty of

Education at the University of Dar es Salaam, stated that in the government Secondary
schools in Tanganyika in 1983, Christians were 78% and all non-Christians were only
22%. Christians are clearly over represented despite the fact that Muslims are 65% in the
population of Tanganyika. The latest research done by the Dar es Salaam University
Muslims Trusteeship (DUMT) and published in 1992 by Al-Haqq International showed
that the number of Muslim students has been falling in the country's university Dar es
Salaam and colleges. At the University of Dar es Salaam alone, the research reported that
the total enrollment for the 1986-1990 was 4,191. Out of this number, Muslim students
were only 586, or 13%, whereas Christians were 3,609 or 87%. It is was not therefore a
sheer coincidence throughout his uninterrupted 24 years as the President of Tanzania
(1961-1985), Nyerere, being a Catholic had always appointed a Christian to head the
Ministry in Education. Muslims stated that because of this ever-increasing under-
representation of Muslims in relation to Christians in Secondary and Higher Education,
all key posts in the Tanzanian administration and public institutions came to be
dominated by Christians, while Muslims largely relegated to menial positions such as
drivers and messengers. The Muslims in Tanganyika are demanding their a fair share of
the national cake because after independence, Tanganyikan Muslim student intake, is
below 10%; the Muslim Cabinet ministers are negligible while Muslim principal
secretaries and heads of parastatal organization are non-existent.

But like Tanganyika, the Muslims in Zanzibar have been discriminated against education
in foreign countries after the forceful union of Tanganyika and Zanzibar to form
Tanzania. Mohammed Mwinyi Mzale, the then Minister for Education in Zanzibar stated
that of the 12 members of the Joint Selection Committee (JOSECO) which selects
students for higher education in university and institutions at home and abroad, none is
from Zanzibar. He lamented that when students on Zanzibar's scholarship turn up at
Tanzania missions abroad, they are kept a stiff arm's length away on the pretext that they
are not on a United Republic's scholarship, even though in fact Zanzibar pays its share in
the Union's higher education budget. He contended that the executive bodies of higher
education are Union only in word but in deeds and in their structure, there are mainland
creatures and are there to do its biding. The Union parliament formulate policies for the
interest of Tanganyika and believed that somehow the Tanganyika and Union
governments are Siamese twins.

AFTERMATH OF NYERERE ON ISLAM

During the leadership of Nyerere (1961-Present), the Christians had much freedom of
their religion as guaranteed in the secular constitution, as hypocritically practiced in all
other secular states. Their freedom includes secularization and evangelization of the
Muslims, who were not allowed to organize themselves independent of the central
authority. The Muslim affairs were articulated through a weak and corrupt organization
called Baraza Kuu la Waislamu Tanzania, the Supreme Council of Tanzania Muslims
(BAKWATA), which works under the protection and guidance of the government. The
absence of an independent Muslim body to represent Muslims created a spiritual vacuum
in Tanganyika. For three decades (1961-1990), Muslims could not exert any meaningful
influence in their society according to their religion. In a bid to end this status quo,
Muslims managed to form Umoja wa Wahubiri wa Mlingano wa Dini (Union of
Preachers for Propagation of Religion) better known as UWAMDI, whose Secretary
General is Sheikh Swaleh Uthman Ngoy. The publication of UWAMDI known as Mizani
(The Balance), is very much concerned with the quality of Muslim leadership in
Tanganyika because right from the start in 1990, it expressed concern about the way
BAKWATA, a body created by the Nyerere's government in December 1968 to lead
exclusively Muslims in Tanganyika.

The Mizani issue of April 6, 1990 published the Juma'a Khutba (Friday Sermon) of
Sheikh Kassim bin Juma bin Khamis, Imam of the Mtoro Mosque in Dar es Salaam,
when he called upon Muslims "Kuwaondoa viongozi wa Kitaifa wa BAKWATA" (to
remove the national leaders of BAKWATA) and he also stated that: "Waislamu
wachoshwa na uongozi wa BAKWATA" (the Muslims are tired of BAKWATA's
leadership). However, the charismatic leader behind the UWAMDI movement is Sheikh
Mussa Hussein, born at Ujiji in 1918 who studied Islam under Sheikh Kibaraka Ibrahim,
a famous Muslim leader in Ujiji known for his relentless opposition to colonialism in
1950s. Sheikh Kibaraka Ibrahim traveled extensively as an itinerant Muslim preacher in
Burundi, Ruanda and Zaire.

Sheikh Mussa Hassan also studied under reputed Ujiji Muslim scholar, Sheikh Songoro
Marjani Lweno (d. 1989), who was well known for his controversial views on the Bible.
His book, Mtume Muhammad (SAW) Katika Bibilia (The Prophet Muhammad (peace be
upon him) in the Bible) was published in Lahore, Pakistan. Most of the famous preachers
who belong to UWAMDI, and travelled under the name of Wahubiri wa Kiislam
(Preachers of Islam) from Ujiji were students of Sheikh Kibaraka Ibrahim and Songoro
Marjani. Among them is Swaleh Uthman Ngoy, whose main task is to answer questions
from Christians, especially from Christian evangelists. As it is attested in his answers to
an Afro-evangelist, Sylvester Gamanya on the divinity of Jesus Christ (pbuh), published
in the Mizani of April 6, 1990. Other students from Ujiji are Othman Matata, the late
Ngariba Mussa Fundi and Muhammed Ali Kawemba, the last two published a pamphlet
in English, Islam in the Bible (1987) but Muhammad Ali and Othman Matata published
two English pamphlets; The Message of Jesus and Muhammad (pbut) in the Bible (1989)
and The Sons of Abraham (1990), the three mentioned pamphlets were published by the
al-Khayriyyah Press in Zanzibar.

Othman Matata, Ngariba Fundi Mussa and Muhammed Ali Kawemba were deported
from Mombasa by the Kenyan authorities in November 1987 which claimed that it is
illegal to address public meetings in Kenya, yet the Reverend Reinhard Bonnke, leader of
"Christ for All Nations" who has a base in Nigeria and is the son of a Pentecostal
preacher from West Germany, was allowed in 1988 by the same Kenyan authorities
under the auspices of two hundred and eleven different Churches in Kenya. Soon after
the Nairobi's Uhuru Park reverberated the gusto sounds of the "Great Gospel Crusade" of
the Rev. Bonnke with his Kenyan interpreter, Rev. Masinde, the Kenyan President Daniel
Arap Moi, himself a born again Christian, commended the Rev. Bonnke's Crusade by
presiding over one of the gatherings. He also wished the Rev. Bonnke to return
periodically in Kenya but the same Muslim scholars from Tanzania were not only
deported from Mombasa for preaching Islam but they were also forced to leave their own
country. Muslim professionals and intellectuals, against much opposition from the
BAKWATA, managed to form in November 1992 an independent Muslims organization
called the Supreme Council of Islamic Organizations and Institutions of Tanzania,
excluding the Zanzibar islands because Islamists there are viewed as secessionists from
the union created by Nyerere. Under his regime, the Christian missionaries were free to
carry out their activities and evangelize the downtrodden Muslims. In 1982, a group
called themselves as "Crusaders" toured all the regions in Tanganyika for preaching
Christianity in public but Abu Bakr Mwilima, Othman Matata, Ngariba Fundi Mussa and
Muhammed Ali Kawemba were barred in 1987. The state controlled media chiefly
dominated by Christians accused them for "sowing seed of hatred and instability" in
Tanzania. Also, Mwinyi, a Muslim from Zanzibar was openly attacked in the Christian
camps.

A person who managed to mobilize Christians opposed to President Ali Hassan Mwinyi's
leadership to counter the "Muslim threat" is none but the firebrand and outspoken the
Rev. Christopher Mtikila, a Christian Fundamentalist guru of the Lutheran Church, which
was instrumental for live-broadcast of Christmas in 1982 at a national level for the first
time in Zanzibar history. Being the active head of Full Salvation Church, the Rev. Mtikila
is also a leader of anti-Islamic battalion when he openly declared that his Crusade to
defend Christianity against Islam. He became prominent in 1988 at the CCM conference
at Kizota in Tanganyika when he wrote to Nyerere, the then Chairman of CCM on behalf
of the Christians opposing Mwinyi's presidency for propping up Islam at the expense of
Christianity. His cyclostyled letters were circulated to all the participants of the
Conference opened by Joseph Warioba, the then Prime Minister. The letter demanded to
immediately investigate and rectify what he termed as a "Dangerous Government Stand"
under President Mwinyi. On the contrary, the Rev. Mtikila asserted that when TANU was
under Nyerere, he was fighting for independence, unity and equality between the citizens
by eradicating religious discrimination.

This is the travesty of truth because Nyerere in his confidential conversation on August 2,
1970, with the Rev. Robert Rweyemaum, the then Secretary General of Tanzania
Episcopal Conference (TEC), the largest Christian denomination of Catholic Church,
Nyerere is quoted in a book published by the Roman Church titled Development and
Religion in Tanzania by Jan P. van Bergen as saying that Nyerere has established in
TANU, a department of political education and deliberately appointed a Christian
minister to head it not because he was a strong politician but because of his Christian
faith. For this justification, Jan P. van Bergen said that the Rev. Mushendwa was put in
charge of TANU's Development of Political Education because of his strong solid
Christian faith. For the past three decades, Nyerere never appointed a single Muslim as
the Minister for Education, yet Muslims did not complain about the Christianization of
the Education Ministry which become a Christian enclave due to Nyerere’s leadership.
The accusation of the Rev. Mtikila, among other Christian fundamentalists that the
"Muslims' aim is to Islamize the whole of Tanzania" because Mwinyi had appointed four
directors in the ministry of education is a manifestation of Christian fundamentalism. If
Islamic fundamentalism is fanaticism, the same goes for Christian fundamentalism as he
rhetorically stated that Muslims are endangering peace and unity in Tanzania despite the
fact that peace and unity have always been the stock-in-pile of the Muslims in his country
since the days of the struggle for Tanganyika independence and post-Tanzania.

It is known that with the exception of the lates Sheikh Sulayman bin Takadir, Sheikh
Hassan bin Ameir al-Shirazy and Sheikh Zubeir Mtevu, the Muslims in Tanganyika
overwhelmingly rejected their own All-Muslim National Union of Tanganyika (AMTU)
to defend national unity under TANU whose president was Nyerere. These Islamists tried
to impress their fellow Muslims that Christians, even they were their fellow
Tanganyikans, had a deep-seated hatred and enmity towards Muslims and that they
would never treat Muslims with fairness and justice once they control political power.
They insisted that after independence, educational imbalance would never be redressed
and the positions of Muslims in education and other social areas would not improve
significantly. Because of their stand, Sheikh Sulayman bin Takadir was expelled from his
then Chairmanship of Elders' Council of TANU, while Sheikh Zubeir bin Mtevu formed
the African National Union (ANC), in opposition to TANU under a Christian leadership
of Nyerere.

Ironically, the Churches in Tanganyika rejected TANU, twice in 1958 at Sumbawanga

and in 1965 at Mbulu. They were scheming hand in glove with the British colonial
government which groomed Nyerere to be the first president in Tanganyika after British.
After independence under Nyerere, Tanzanian Christians are reaping what they did not
plant but are enjoying the benefits of every sector cemented by Christian Church
Movement (CCM) supported by the Western nations.

Khatib M. Rajab al-Zinjibari

http://victorian.fortunecity.com/portfolio/543/nyerere-and-islam.html Accessed on 30th

June 2009